Just Look the Other Way
by WednesdayJones
Summary: Narcissa knows he does not love her, so she instead thinks of flowers, buying trinkets and having someone else in his bed. She is well acquainted with how much easier it all can be when you just look the other way. Rated for strong language and scenes of a sexual nature.


This was written a very long time ago and has only just been found on a old hard drive. One of a number of old/new fics appearing on my account as part of a purge.

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, just the situations.

Warning: Rated for language. There is a surprising amount of it, peppered through this little one-shot. I, apparently, have a dirty little mouth.

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**Just Look the Other Way**

She knows Lucius has never loved her.

She knows he slept around behind her back, and sometimes right in front of her, whilst they were at Hogwarts. She wasn't sorted into Ravenclaw, but despite that, Narcissa is smart enough to know that sometimes (most of the time) "meeting a business associate" really means "going to meet someone to fuck in an expensive hotel room for three days straight". In the years since Hogwarts, nothing has changed.

Over the years, Narcissa has become accustomed to her husband's sexual exploits. At Hogwarts they were taught that a Slytherin never lets his or her weakness show. That a Slytherin is always, _always_ subtle and discreet. At school she was trained well in this, the years since have made her an expert. Lucius, on the other hand, obviously never paid enough attention to that particular lesson, caring little for who and where he fucks, and who watches whilst he does it.

On her wedding night, when Lucius invited one of her bridesmaids into their marital bed and proceeded to thrust into her with all the energy and wild abandon of his nineteen years, she just rolled over and looked the other way, ignoring the moans and the groans and the rising and falling of the bed. Instead she thought of flowers, of beautiful, winding gardens full of pale pink fairy lanterns and sunshine yellow star tulips. Instead she thought of someone who knew how they were her favourites and bought them to her in bunches every day.

When she caught him fucking Mrs Zabini up against the expensive wallpaper in their bedroom, some pieces of precious cloth and silk discarded carelessly on the floor, whilst others bunched up around their waists, she turned, looked the other way. When her head had cleared enough for her to face reailty again, she walked back down the stairs, towards the fireplace, towards Diagon Alley and towards the shops. That day she spent almost a quarter of what they had in their vault on things she had always desired, all the while wishing someone else knew what those desires were and was instead buying them for her. That evening she threw most of what she bought in the fireplace and walked away whilst it burned.

When she walked in on Lucius "initiating" one of the new, young female Death Eater recruits on the mahogany wood dining room table, crystal brandy tumblers – a wedding gift to them both from her parents - shattered on the floor, their contents long down gluttonous throats, she sighed, looked the other way, calling on Tibby, telling him to clean the room once "Mister Malfoy is through". Then, head held high, back straight, she walked out of the room, closing the heavy doors behind her with a quiet 'snick', and to the library, where she curled up in her favourite Edwardian chair, dreaming of someone curled up next to her, running their fingers through her hair as she drifted off.

On the rare occasion that both husband and wife were in the the same bed, there would be no talking, no lying together in each other's arms, no furious, passionate kissing. There would be nothing that could accidentally be classified as warmth or affection from either of them. There would only be staccato movements, grunts and groans; him desperately trying to satisfy his cock's desires and her letting him thrust against her, into her, head turned, mind a world away, thinking of other things, other beds, other people.

Oh, she thought about leaving him many times. She thought about getting out of their bed and walking out of the house, down the driveway and going anywhere else, but she was a Malfoy _and_ a Black. That meant something to her, something she wasn't going to give up, even for him. Instead she did nothing but plaster that fake, vacant smile on her face at parties and gatherings, playing the loving wife and doting mother, and looking the other way when she saw him fucking Pansy Parkinson's mother in the darkness of the library on _her_ chair.

Now she grows herself bunches of bright, beautiful flowers, buys herself expensive trinkets and dreams of someone else at night, all the while knowing that Lucius has never loved her. But that's okay, because she's never loved him either.


End file.
